Founder, CEO @ Outscal | Land Jobs in the gaming industry | EA, Junglee, D.E. Shaw, | CMU, DCE
2 days ago, Behaviour Interactive laid off 95 individuals, citing “unprecedented competition” and wanting to focus on its “historical strengths” as the main reasons. BI is one of Canada’s largest independent game developers and publishers, with an average revenue per employee of $282K (approx) and a consistent revenue growth since 2015. On the surface, the world praises a studio for its games and talks about its big moves. Like that, BI is known for its horror titles (especially Dead by Daylight), partnering with WB for Mortal Kombat 1 and co-creating AAA games like Fallout Shelter with Bethesda. We endlessly glorify studios and their games, but we rarely talk about the individuals who actually make these games a reality. Nobody talks about it when game developers who were truly responsible for a video game’s success lose their jobs. In the end, behind all this visible glory, game developers are the ones actually forced to bear the volatile fluctuations in the gaming industry's economy. We congratulate studios when they make great games, but we fire our game developers as soon as things don’t seem to be working out! Imagine putting years of hard work into building a fine game only to hear one day that you’ve been removed from the effing project. So, here is my attempt to highlight game devs who were impacted by Behaviour Interactive. Repost and tag the right people. Let’s bring them maximum visibility from recruiters and game studios that are currently hiring: Jorge Eduardo Chaparro — As a Sr. Community Manager for BI, Jorge established social media strategies for ‘The Casting of Frank Stone’ and ‘Islands of Insight’. Remarkably, he has also been a senior level Community Manager for Studio Onoma (formerly Square Enix Montreal) and Square Enix. Marika D. — Marika was also BI’s senior community Manager but for its most renowned hit, Dead by Daylight. She has worked on Capcom and Disney’s DLCs apart from DBD. Before BI, she worked for Ubisoft as a Social Media Content Specialist. Meriem B. — A highly talented Social Media Manager who also supported the launch of Islands on Insight to corporate platforms and multiple chapters for Dead by Daylight. Moreover, she contributed to the growth of Behaviour’s audience by 10%. Vincent Davila — A Game & Level Designer of Behaviour Interactive who worked on four unannounced projects before being laid off with some experience in production, too. Sara Calzada — A killer talent who started her career as a Camera Operator and ultimately became an Art Director & Team Lead for BI. Sara has also been a Designer and Concept Artist for Netflix’s 3D animated series - Kitti Katz. #layoffsupport
Thank you for signal boosting 🙏🏼🚀 Witnessing the support peers are so quick to offer each other in the industry has been a very heartwarming and encouraging silver lining to this unfortunate situation ❤️🩹
Thank you for sharing. The way this community continues to support each other through the constant chaos is really what keeps a lot of us going. Big hug to all former colleagues and anyone who's been impacted by these events.
Thank you so much for highlighting these badasses!
Thank you for the support, Mayank!! 🙏
It's very sad to hear. I wish you the best of luck finding a good job soon 🙏
This is a wonderful post Mayank. The community is standing together for each other and I wish them all the luck.
3D Animator
1moAll I hear in your post is I think it is time we as a group of talented people starts our own company and work as independent video games devs/publishers. Imagine some studios where everyone are shareholders and not just replaceable assets in the eyes of the administration. This movement is happening in film right now and I could really see that happening here too.